Despite a glimmer of hope, with authorization to hire 768 more agents and to pile on overtime, the security line issue at U.S. airports continues to generate bad news. Yesterday (Friday) backed-up security lines at Dallas/Fort Worth got so bad that American Airlines delayed five flights because the passengers were still in screening lines.
Despite American’s holding the planes, dozens of travelers still missed the flights and had to be re-booked. At O’Hare, lines reached to nearly two hours at one point.
The airlines are clear about where they place the blame: On TSA, and on Congress, which cut the screening force by over 4,000 over the past few years, and has delayed in restoring cuts. Delta’s CEO told the Associated Press “the longer lines get the more passengers are going to miss flights and there’s not much you can do about that.”
I hate the bag fees, but they’re not the problem. The TSA is. Everyone would still have a carry-on bag, albeit a smaller one if they could check a suitcase for free.
My experiences in Calgary, Frankfurt and Spain in the past month. Waiting times were never more than 10 minutes and usually less than 5 minutes to be screened. You just need enough of and a motivated staff that gets people through quickly
European airlines have taken a big hit this year with Europeans staying home more. It was because of terrorism before airport security and also in public places in Brussels and Paris. Isn’t that more of a risk now? We have accepted that minor risk on other forms of transportation and still go about our lives. I’d vote to cut back on scanning 100% of the people in airports to occasionally, like we did a few years ago. We can still walk through metal detectors.
I guess the added carry-on bags are factors too in slowing the lines. Would be nice if airlines did cancel those checked bag fees to help out at least during peak travel months.
Several Senators suggested last week that the airlines kill the bag fees to speed up the lines, but there was an audible silence on that…
Meanwhile, in Paris the lines have been growing, too, and causing delays at CDG; the airport authority is calling for more staff to speed up border controls.